Correction: An earlier version of this story included an incorrect age for Linda Farrell as well as an incorrect reference to where she studied acting.

Belinda Farrell lives.

She swims with dolphins and whales, and walks on hot coals. She drove Hollywood stunt cars at breakneck speeds. She dabbled as a TV news reporter, performed as "Snow White" at Disneyland, acted on TV and in movies and nearly worked for the CIA.

She's a trained hypnotherapist, a practitioner of reconnective healing, a believer in past-life regression.

Life is exciting and interesting if you "Find Your Friggin' Joy" (published by Balboa Press) — which, not coincidentally, is the title of her first book, a 178-page personal journey through profound tragedy, physical pain and financial ruin to the luminescent, seize-the-day attitudes that guide her today.

The 67-year-old Santa Cruz resident describes her book as a "not-for-the-faint-of-heart manual for those brave enough to confront their demons, face their feelings and exalt in their potential," in part by using the ancient Hawaiian teachings known as Huna to "take personal responsibility, unplug from old, nonproductive stories, and step into the frequencies of your Higher Self."

Farrell will be featured at a "meet and greet" from 1-3p.m. Saturday at Pilgrim's Way Community Bookstore (Dolores Street, between Fifth and Sixth avenues, in Carmel) to sign her book and share the unique road she navigated to her own happiness.

Personal setbacks in her life have been multiple and major. Her only son, Brian, committed suicide at age 30 to end his battle with chronic pain. Her marriage ended when she was 40. She lost her life savings in a Ponzi scheme. Severe spinal problems (some congenital, some from injuries), including a herniated discs, nerve damage and partial paralysis, brought a diagnosis from doctors that she'd never walk again without surgery.

"I had been married to an orthopedic surgeon for 18 years and was well aware of the risks of back surgery," she says. "I also deeply believed that the body had a healing mechanism that, when given the right direction, can find its way back to wholeness."

Belief in Huna

Rejecting doctors' recommendations, Farrell went to Hawaii to employ the techniques of Huna, a spiritual, metaphysical healing practice, believed to date back 35,000 years, that, according to its literature, "connects a person physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually with a Higher Power that can empower you to bring into your life whatever you desire."

In her case, Farrell says it resulted in a complete and permanent repair of her spinal issues — many of which had been lifelong problems — in just four days.

Hard to believe? Believing is the key to Huna, she says.

"We've been trained to look outside ourselves for answers," Farrell says. "We're trained to go to the doctor, and to take this pill, or that pill, but most of are disconnected from our ability to harness the power of the body as an amazing healing machine. I healed in four days. I was given a whole new spine. I had suffered from scoliosis from childhood, and that's gone, too. I'm a brand-new me."

The old "me" was, in fact, pretty unique.

She says she never met her father, who was married to her mother for only a year and a half, and was raised in Los Angeles by her mom and grandparents. Whenever she heard arguing in the home, she escaped to the rooftops, where she had "a secret fort" under one of the eves.

"I was a curious child and a bit of a daredevil," she says. "I loved the adrenaline high of jumping from one roof to another."

She climbed trees, and raced and jumped bicycles — activities that, in her 40s, would evolve into auto racing and an eight-year career as a stunt driver in movies, TV and commercials.

Her family sent her to Catholic school as a mean of calming her wild-child ways, but her faith in that project took a hit when, during confession, she noticed the priest reading the comics section of the newspaper, rather than focusing on the apologies she was expecting him to relay to the Lord.

'Freedom papers'

As an eighth-grader, she was given her "freedom papers" by the school. "It was a polite way of being expelled," she says. "I could not have been happier."

Farrell graduated from UC Berkeley and applied for a job as a tour guide at Disneyland. Instead, they dressed her up as "Snow White."

Next came a temporary job with the KABC TV news department, a six-month gig during which she interviewed Gov. Ronald Reagan, numerous actors, did a story on a nudist colony, and was an eyewitness to a robbery and murder.

Fluency in Spanish (one of her college majors) led to an offer to become a covert CIA agent in Madrid, but after a week of training in Washington D.C. she decided the job wasn't a comfortable fit. Instead, she took a job working for Illinois Sen. Charles H. Percy, which led to a meeting with the man who would become her husband and the father of her two children. It was an abusive relationship that ended after 18 years.

"Divorced at 40, my soul's journey went into hyper-speed," she says.

She studied under motivational speaker Tony Robbins, who taught her about the power of the mind and inspired her to "firewalk" over a bed of coals that had been heated to 2,000 degrees. She says she's done it 18 times.

"The firewalk is really a metaphor for what you can do in your life," she says. "Knowing that I could walk on fire, I asked myself, 'What else would I like to do in my life?'"

The answer, she says, was that she wanted to learn to drive a race car — an aspiration that led to her eight-year career as a stunt driver.

Her quest for inner healing led her to training in hypnotherapy, neuro-linguistic programming, past-life regression and Huna.

"Huna is the ancient healing path of the Hawaiians," she says. "When I hear the chants, sleeping cells awakened from within. I knew this was the icing on the cake for which I had been searching."

Additional information about Farrell's appearance Saturday at Pilgrim's Way may be obtained by calling the bookstore at 624-4955.